


Oh yeah, I’m a reaper man

by OmniscienceIsBliss



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Drabble, Gen, Gore, Partially inspired by the Mother Mother song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-07-11
Packaged: 2019-06-08 19:35:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15250509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OmniscienceIsBliss/pseuds/OmniscienceIsBliss
Summary: When in front of the operating table, Valdemar is free.





	Oh yeah, I’m a reaper man

**Author's Note:**

> Character analysis of my absolute favorite secondary character in The Arcana. Valdemar is glorious.

Before anything else, Quaestor Valdemar is a scientist. They are no mere doctor. Their job, their aim, is not to just _cure_ illness. No, not at all. They’d much rather cause them, just to be able to observe how a new pathogen twists into strange shapes and burns and utterly destroys a human body, how sweetly the skin will turn yellow, then purple, then brown, its structure invaded and completely transformed by something as small as a water drop.

As a scientist, Valdemar seeks nothing but to develop and enlarge their knowledge, nothing but to satisfy their ever present, all engulfing curiosity for all that is living and all that is dead. But most of all, they are fascinated by the metamorphosis of the first into the latter. That’s why they became a doctor, after all, why they made the choice to spend their entire life wearing white robes and black gloves, constantly lingering in the feeling of their slender fingers sinking in the warm paradise that is someone else’s intestines and stomach and liver and internal fluids. They love doing this, they live for the feeling of blood sliding down their hands and arms, changing from warm to cold, from liquid to dry, from pure crimson to a rusty shade of brown, and for the exhilarating, unadulterated raw power that comes with being the wielder of the knife.

Excluding biological processes and pathophysiology, human beings are not all that interesting anyway, so preoccupied as they are with, honestly, useless things, such as deciding what’s right and what’s wrong, moral codes, their ridiculous black and white mentality, their constant obsession with stuff that shouldn’t even matter, all things that do nothing but make one’s life difficult. After a while, they all become so predictable and boring. If not malicious, vindictive and violent, they are greedy, cruel, hypocritical, they hurt others and themselves in pursuit of even more hurt and suffering. Being human is such a pitiful existence.

Valdemar had never been like them in the slightest. They had never fit in. They are used to being criticized, even hated, for their _unethical methods_ , or so people like to call their way of dissecting and making use of broken flesh that will never serve any purpose anymore, not to its owner at least. Morality is such an overrated concept, anyway; it mercilessly crushes and stomps down on scientific advancement. And what for? If anything, that morality everyone likes to oh so preciously defend is nothing but an obstacle.

Human beings are disgusting. But their bodies, oh their bodies are walking treasure chests, maps to ever-changing worlds to be explored and discovered. Why would anyone renounce the thrill of such an alluring adventure? And yet, they have no one to share the beauty of overflowing fluids and fumes and the heavenly sounding softness of bowels with if not with themself and themself alone. Used to working solo, avoided by even their colleagues and subordinates, Valdemar is different, and they know it, and they are fine with it.

They’ve been called a monster for the things they do on the operating table. Many times. But, when they revel in the chaos that is the sick, broken down architecture of a plague-stricken life form, when they can spend hours watching a pulsating heart squirming inside an open chest, Valdemar is free.


End file.
